The Spring Chinook Salmon run is just getting way. These are wonderful fish to catch and eat. Your heart will pound with excitement as you hook a 20-40 pound fish with the energy and anger of a two-year-old child in full tantrum mode!

Once salmon transition from the ocean to fresh water, they stop eating. The males start to develop curved jawbones, which prevent them from closing their mouths completely. So why do they bite? It’s much like a fly buzzing around your head. At first, you just ignore it. But after awhile, you start to become irritated. At first you may swipe at it to shoo it off. Later you are on a mission to rid yourself from this damn fly!

That is why you allow your rod to go down three or four times before you set the hook. The salmon needs to chew it up a few times to make sure it is deep enough in it’s mouth that you will not pull it out by setting the hook.

Now the fun begins! Just like a defiant two-year-old, Salmon do not like to be controlled. They have been running free all of their lives. The ability to swim hard and fast has prevented them from becoming lunch for one of the thousands of predators they have encounter during their four to five year lifetime. They are not willing to give up now. They too are on a mission to return to the location of their conception. This is a one-way trip for these magnificent creatures, so they are willing to devote all of their energy to being free again.

So enjoy the screaming of your reel as you battle one these Pacific Northwest wonders. And just because you hook it does not mean you will win the battle. So keep your line tight. And maybe you will be the victor of this battle.

P. S. They really taste good smothered in garlic.

Ken Bear Cole

Fishing with Bear LLC

Here in Oregon we are blessed to have some wonderful fishing opportunities. Along with having multiple runs of Steelhead and Salmon, we also have the White Sturgeon. These fish grow and mature at a slow rate. It takes approximately ten years for a Sturgeon to reach the minimum keeper length of 38 inches. I could take a Sturgeon up to 20 years to reach the maximum keeper length of 54 inches. Some of the species found in the Columbia and Willamette Rivers can reach up to 22 feet in length and weigh 1200 pounds. Some of these fish could have been born before the Civil War. It is an honor for one of these giants to suck down your bait and allow you to fight them.

The thrill of seeing one of these giants break the surface of the river will cause your heart to race, but hold on because if you have hooked a large oversized Sturgeon you could be fighting the fish for a while, up to two hours. It is wise to visit the gym to prepare for a trip and bring friends. Your arms and back may tire long before your Sturgeon is ready to give up. It’s an affordable thrill you will remember the rest of your life.

Many trips produce sub-legal or “shaker” fish. They are called Shakers because they love to shake their heads on the way to the boat. It is common for the boat of four fishermen to catch 20 or more fish per day, so there is a lot of action for everyone. So give a call to a local guide and book a trip to catch fish that have lived longer then you.

Ken Bear Cole

Fishing with Bear LLC

Many of the local lakes are closing after this weekend. So it time to venture out to other year round lakes. Hagg lake will be open until mid November. It’s a great Fall and Spring location. There are huge Trophy Trout in the lake weighing upwards of 20 pounds. There is also a prevelant native Trout and Bass population. These fish fight harder and are extremely tasty.

I was fishing there yesterday 9/25/09. I found the fish to be scattered through out the lake with few large concentrations of fish. The water tempature is still in the high 60′s, but the lake level has droped approximately 25′ from spring levels.

I tried a variety of different techniques which have worked well in the past, but after 3 hours I had only caught 2 Trout. I caught one trolling Powerbait and the other was caught on a fly. Few anglers that I met were catching many fish, that is until I met two Bass fishermen who were catching Trout. They were using a Rapala lure. I have used these lures in the past to catch some heafty trout. So I soon switched to a Rapala and added some weight to run it a little deeper. Within the next hour and a half I had caught five nice Trout and a small Smallmouth Bass.

Since the Rapala resembles a swimming bait fish, you can troll it a little faster then you would if you were pulling flashers and a Wedding Ring. Varing speed will also provide a greater depth range.

While you are out on the lake take time to enjoy the wonderful birds in the area. The Blue Heron are out along with Bald Eagles and Osprey. These are all magnificent creatures!

See you at the dock!

Ken Bear Cole

Fishing with Bear LLC

Fall is a wonderful time to be on the water. The water is cooling from the Summer heat and the fish are moving up from the deep. They have continued to grow in length and stature. You will especially notice their extra engery as they attack your lure or bait.

I was fishing at Northfork Reservoir, which is located approximately 7 miles East of Estacada Oregon, on Sunday 9/20/09. The weather was great with just a little wind. By the time I made a trolling run  down most of the lake, I already had 5 trout in the live wells. It was a fantastic time. I stopped counting after catching 12 trout. Most of the day was spent catching and releasing fish.

During these high fish count days, I like to try different techniques. I make a lure, which is much like a Wedding Ring. I normally fish it behind lake troll flashers, but I decided to use the lure alone with a few large split shot up the line for weight. It worked wonderfully! The lure is so light it fishes extremely well on an ultra-light rod. If you try the technique, make sure to tip the lure with some nightcrawler.

Northfork Reservoir will close for the season this Sunday, so don’t wait to go. Otherwise, you may want to check out Hagg Lake south of Forest Grove, Oregon. It will be open 6 more weeks and the water level is lowering for the winter.

See you at the dock.

Ken Bear Cole

Fishing with Bear LLC

Have you ever wondered why lures work at times and are ignored other times? It’s all about who is the predator. Since Wal-Mart or your local grocery do not exist in the world of fish, they need to forage for their own food. Many insects are on the diet for fish such as Trout and Steelhead. But they also eat smaller fish and that green slimy stuff on the bottom of the river or lake. So there is always a predator vs. prey relationship at work.

Spinners tend to make sounds like a wounded fish or struggling insect in the water. Other lures make a swimming motion like a fish. These various actions look and sound like a nice snack for a hungry fish.

As the population of fish increases, so does the competition for food. That is why a lure is one of the best choices when fishing in a large school of fish. Reeling it quickly through the school will often be met with a strike.

A similar situation exists during spawning runs. The anatomy of Steelhead and Salmon will change as they re-enter freshwater. The throat of the Steelhead will close to just 20% of normal capacity, thus limiting what they can eat. Salmon stop feeding in freshwater. The males develop a hook like nose preventing the mouth from closing.

At this point you may be wondering how these fish are caught with a hook. Think of it like a fly buzzing around your head. You can tolerate it for a while, but sooner or later, you are going to swat at it. Salmon are the same, except they use their mouths. They may slap at the lure with their head or bite it, either way you could get a hook-up.

So make sure you have an ample supply in your tackle box.

See You At The Dock!

Ken Bear Cole
Fishing with Bear LLC

“Max,” The Super Lure

One lure that has consistently tricked Trout & Bass into biting is the Kastmaster. It has a wonderful swimming action, which seldom twists your line. It is now available in a number of colors, but the only option was chrome or gold when I discovered the lure. It’s a great lure to have in everyone’s tackle box.

But that’s not what this article is about. It about one of those days you dream of, where everything is going right. I was on a beautiful mountain lake with a soft breeze kissing my face. The warn sun was on my back and Osprey were soaring overhead. They were easy to locate as they cried, calling others to come feed on the nice fat trout below. I tied a Kastmaster lure to my line and cast it into the emerald green water. It was attacked by a nice two-pound trout, which was struggling to be free, as three or four of his friends followed him to the boat. Yes that was a glorious day, that is, until a tree reached out and grabbed my favorite lure.

With malice and forethought, it reach out from the banks of the lake and snatched my lure out of the sky with a death grip, wrapping line around its limb and embedding the treble into the wood. At first I wasn’t concerned. This lure has escaped the clutches of snags in the water ripping the limbs from the water. Not even submerged boulders we able to steel “Max, the super lure” from me. We had been together for so long, it just seemed appropriate to name it. No this tree chose the wrong lure to mess with.

Being in my boat, I thought the rescue would be easy and it should have been. The lure was just a little too hi to reach it, while standing in my little aluminum boat. So I tossed a rope around the limb and lowered it to retrieve my friend. Just as I touched my prized possession, the end of the limb broke causing two things to happen simultaneously. The limb shot towards the sky like a rocket, embedding two of the three hooks into my hand. I reacted by falling out of the boat and breaking the limb a little further up the tree. Being focused on the pain of the hooks in my hand, I had not noticed as that evil limb struck a hornet’s nest.

When I surfaced, the air around me hummed like a blender with a bad motor bearing. I immediately retreated underwater, where I discovered that I had also capsized my boat. After what seemed like hours under my capsized boat, a rescue party pulled me from the lake, but accidentally sunk my boat.

The doctor at the emergency room had great difficulty removing the hooks because he was laughing and crying too hard as I explained what happened. Finally as the hooks were removed and my hand was sewn up, they left me alone for a moment with the remnants or Max. I knew he would be restored with a new split ring and treble hook. It would be like old times.

As I hobbled to the pay phone, to call my wife, I was trying to decide how I could explain this, because I had told her I was in Seattle on a business meeting. I hope I can get the boat out.

See you at the dock!

Ken Bear Cole
Fishing with Bear LLC

During the warm summer months both fishermen and other water sport enthusiasts share the same water, but sometimes with conflicts. These conflicts occur because of violating ones space.

Skiers love to go fast and blast loud music. This tends to eliminate a tranquil time on the water. Rather it causes a wake the size of an ocean wave. Bald Eagles, Osprey and Blue Heron, must not enjoy rap or rock-n-roll played so loud that it shakes the leaves off the trees. When you have enough boats going fast and playing loud music, it’s like being inside a washing machine filled with rocks. Everything is being rocked back and forth like there is an earthquake on the water.

This can really anger some fishermen who are out to be one with nature and catch a few fish. You see some fishing boats are smaller then a bathtub. When you add someone with “dun lap disease” (you know, their tummy, dun lapped over their belt) and 4” of clearance between the water and the top of the boat, a 6” wave can be quite scary. Especially when the music is so loud that it causes your aluminum boat to act like a tuning fork. It’s not that the fishermen are afraid of sinking the boat. It’s just difficult to hold your fishing rod, run the motor and bail out the boat at the same time. This is especially hard if you have a fish on. That’s why smart fishermen have rod holders and sump pumps on board.

And why do fishermen want to stand up in a small boat? Have they been out in the sun too long? These brave acrobats are seldom wearing a life jacket. These must be the descendants of bull riders. You know, it’s the sport where you wrap a rope around a bull. Then you sit on the bull, and wrap that same rope around your hand until all feeling is lost. You wear gloves so you don’t see your fingers explode. But the real excitement starts once the pen gate opens and someone chinches another rope around the bull’s gonads. The bull’s eyes bulge from their sockets as he leaps for joy, trying to get the fool off his back; and then stomp him into the ground. I guess that does make standing up in a small boat seem reasonable.

So the next time you are out on the water, please be considerate of one another.

Fishermen: don’t try to hook the skier as they pass by. You probably won’t be able to stop the skier, but they may run over your boat and cut it in half.

Skiers: please turn down the XX?!!!XX music before someone shoots you, thinking you are an elk on skies. Well, that’s what they are going to tell the police.

See You At The Dock,

Ken Bear Cole
Fishing with Bear LLC

As a fishing guide, I am always faced with what will work today. The fishing lure, which was working well yesterday, may not work today. So I carry a variety of weapons in my fishing arsenal. All of which, have worked extremely well in the past. But what will work today?

There are thousands of different fishing lures on the market today. To the average person, many look the same, but they come in different weights, colors, blade configuration and sizes. So what should you buy? The manufactures want you to buy all of them. Some claim they catch so many fish “they should be outlawed”. While others catch more fishermen then fish with their sparkly designs and sharp hooks.

About those sharp hooks! It’s bad protocol to hook a fellow fisherman, while casting. Yes they put up quite a fight as you try to reel them in, but the screaming is disturbing to others on the lake. Barbed hooks are rather difficult and painful to remove when you only have a rusty pair of pliers and a knife.

Large tuna lures, which are the size of your foot, can be dangerous if they come loose. You see it was hooked to a supersonic missile called a tuna. It stretched your monofilament fish line like a budgie cord causing the lure to return at the speed of sound. You will be glad to realize the boat has an ice machine; once you awake from your temporary coma!

There are few things more sad, then the look on the face of a fishermen, who has just lost his favorite lure or that lure which cost $7.95, which is now embedded in a log the size of your truck. Yes these are sad days, but remember, there are more lures at the tackle shop. Maybe that is why the credit card company just raised your limit.

See You At The Dock!

Ken Bear Cole
Fishing with Bear LLC

If you have been to a fishing tackle shop lately, you have discovered there are literally thousands of different fishing lures. They have all caught fish on given days, but some are more consistently productive then others. Here are some of the best:

•    Spinners: These lures make sounds in the water, which will either attract or challenge the fish. There are a number of different sizes and colors. Smaller fish tend to bite smaller lures, but that is just a trend. I have caught 5-pound trout on a spinner, which was less then an inch long. You simply need to experiment with what they want that day. Some good brands are Meps, Bang Tail and Rooster Tail.
•    Swimmers: These lures resemble a fish swimming. They should go in a back and forth motion. They need to be shinny, resembling the flash of light off of fish scales. These lures are to resemble bait fish. If you are targeting a spawning fish like a Salmon or Steelhead, the lure will resemble a fish coming to attack the nest and steal eggs. Types Of Swimmers: Quick Fish, Flat Fish, Crank baits, Castmaster Wiggle Warts, Spoons, Crocodile, Dick Nite, Super Duper, … and many more.
•    Tuning A Lure: You may need to “tune” the lure so it swims straight. Check this by pulling the lure in the water where you can see it. You should tie your leader directly to the lure, without a snap swivel. Place a swivel on the other end of the leader, and attach it to your main line. You may need to bend the lure at the connection point to make it swim straight. This will result in many more bites.
•    Enhance the lure: Adding a small portion of a nightcrawler, Powerbait or other type bait can greatly increase the odds of a strike. Make sure the bait does not alter the action of the lure! This will cause the fish to ignore it. Scent is also becoming a very popular enhancement. Pro Cure makes scents, which glow. These are good when fishing deeper depths or in dark water.

See You at the Dock.

Ken Bear Cole
Fishing with Bear

Many people envy my being able to work as a fishing guide. Being on the water, catching all those fish. But it’s not all fun. Sometimes it’s work.

Sometimes running around on the boat, attending to customers, untangling lines and trying to keep the boat in a somewhat straight line and off the rocks has it’s own stress. But I always try to keep things light and cheery. It helps having wonderful clients who are having fun and catching lots of fish.

But other times trout are finicky eaters. The fish finder is beeping and marking large schools of fish, but they simply won’t bite. It’s like they are laughing at me. That’s when I want to toss a quarter stick of dynamite into the water, tell my passengers to hold on, and wait for the boom! They wouldn’t be laughing then! No they would be floating to the surface where I could scoop them up in the net. I could then stand on the bough of the boat and proclaim, “I am the king of the world.” But that could be a little scary for my clients.

I know, when the fish start to resist the exotic presentations of a night crawler tipped spinner, trolled after flashers at the perfect speed; I could rip off my clothes, dive into the water and grab those tasty trout with my bare hands. But I am concerned about the reaction of my passengers seeing a 300 pound man surfacing and displaying the catch in a Speedo. It simply could be too much for some of them. I am also concerned about Captain Ahab thrusting a harpoon into my back, claiming he finally got the great white whale.

No, I will simply do my best to trick the fish into attacking my client’s lines. Tell a few jokes, enjoy the beautiful scenery and watch the Osprey dive into the water to pluck out it’s dinner. But that dynamite thing sounds like fun!

See You at the dock.

Ken Bear Cole

Fishing with Bear LLC